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Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Delayed Until Summer 2012, Drops Cross-Platform Play With PS3

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Valve has remained tight-lipped regarding CS:GO ever since it first got revealed in August of last year. While the game makes appearances at various events, expos and conventions every now and then, and while the closed PC beta has really kicked off recently, Valve still hasn’t said or showed much about the game.

But in a rather… unsurprising move (we all know about Valve Time by now), it would appear that Global Offensive has suffered an… offensive delay. Myehehehe.

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Delayed Until Summer 2012, Drops Cross-Platform Play With PS3

At the Xbox Spring Showcase which took place recently in San Francisco, Valve announced that CS:GO is now set for a summer 2012 release (the news comes via GeekSailor). Previously scheduled for “early 2012”, it had recently become apparent that CS:GO would have to be postponed until later in the year. And indeed it has. Still, at least we can be sure the game will be as polished as it can possibly be. Lord knows the Counter-Strike crowd is a hard one to please.

Valve have even released some new screenshots of one of CS:GO’s brand new offerings in terms of maps – DE_Lake (we have a full article on all of CS:GO’s new and old maps), apparently a smaller-scale map with just one bomb site, designed to accomodate close-quarters engagements using SMG’s and shotguns. It’s somewhat based off the Boathouse Finale chapter of the Death Toll campaing in Left 4 Dead 1. There’s even a bit of CS_Militia’s spirit in there:

Doesn’t look too shabby if you ask me. I’ll miss Militia, though. One thing that has to be added to this map is a Cinematic Physics animation for a successful bomb detonation. Hell, that should be added to every single map. And while we’re at it, why not bring back CS:S’s 2010 bomb detonation effect? Looks way better than what we’ve got in CS:GO.

Moving on, let’s check out a video of Lake, being played in the Arsenal Demolition mode, with some commentary from Chet Faliszek of Valve. In case you missed the memo, Arsenal Mode is CS:GO’s all-new game mode, based on the Gun Game server mod for CS and developed together with those mod creators. Arsenal mode encompasses two game types: Arsenal Demolition and Arms Race.

Arsenal Demolition is a cross between Gun Game and the classic Counter-Strike gameplay. If you kill someone in a certain round, then that’s going to boost your weapon progression up to the next weapon (in a bold new move, the next weapon will be a lesser weapon, although it’s unclear if the other Arsenal game type, Arms Race, will also use backwards weapon progression, or if it’ll go with the classic Gun Game progression), but only in the next round. If you get several other kills after your first kill in that round, then you’ll also get some extra grenades in the next round. If you don’t get any kills in that round, then next round you’ll get boosted back to a higher weapon. Arsenal Demolition has no instant respawning, unlike Arms Race. It also provides the Terrorists with the same base objective of planting the C4 at the bomb site. It seems like Casual Mode is being used in this video, but I’m not even sure if Arsenal Mode supports Casual or Competitive.

Arms Race (which is not shown in this video, and has not yet been revealed publically) is the second Arsenal Mode game type – it’s basically the classic Gun Game experience: frantic deathmatch gameplay, where you respawn instantly and get a new weapon immediately after each new kill you make. No C4, no distractions. It’s still unclear if Arms Race uses the same kind of backwards progression as Arsenal Demolition – we’ll try to ask Valve about it and let you guys know. In addition, it seems like the new maps are restricted to Arsenal Demolition – while Classic Mode, which is the old-school CS gameplay, will use all the classic CS maps exclusively. Arms Race might also have a couple exclusive maps of its own, and Arsenal Mode, as a whole, will add eight new maps to CS:GO in total.

But enough talk – let’s check out the video!

Big announcement near the end – the next CS:GO beta update will feature Arsenal Mode. Chet doesn’t specify if we’ll have any new maps for it, or if it’ll be either Arms Race or Arsenal Demolition (which, again, are the two Arsenal Mode game types), but it’s pretty great anyway. He says Friday, and by that he actually means last Friday – the video was shot a couple of days ago, and the update has since been postponed to… tomorrow, I guess. Either way, beta testers should be getting psyched right about now.

We’ve also got a more distressing announcement – okay, maybe not distressing, but it’s a bit of a disappointment. Chet also told Joystiq that all plans for cross-platform play in Global Offensive have been scrapped. Previously, the plan was for CS:GO to offer cross-play between PC-Mac and PS3, using skill-based matchmaking to set the best of both worlds against each other, regardless of platform or choice of control peripherals. This is Chet’s reasoning for the move:

“The beta has proved we want to update not just the beta, but the game itself post-launch frequently on the PC. To do that we need to separate the platforms so one doesn’t hamstring the other. So for that, we have removed the idea of cross-platform play — essentially make all platforms stronger by not mixing them.”

It’s a shame, but I can definitely see why they did it. Good call – the PS3 will still receive great support (and we can still count on them being able to use the PlayStation Move for motion controls; as well as a mouse/keyboard combo), so it’s not a huge loss.

Either way, it does sound as if the future of CS:GO is looking bright. I’ll see you folks in the beta!

7 Comments

  1. why use the word “delayed”? from the outset, valve have stated that the beta-testing will determine the ship date.

  2. Is that dynamic sun shadows?! When was that added, I never heard anything about it!?!

  3. The graphics have been greatly improved!!! 🙂 Plus, I’m not sure, but I think that there is new audio! 😀

  4. Source is looking spiffy.

  5. Certainly is looking much better than it did when they first showed it and a lot of my doubts have been pretty much put to rest. I’m honestly starting to get excited 🙂

  6. I can see why they scrapped cross-platform; it sounds worse on paper than it is. Nice article.

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